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Features » August 13, 2015

Iran and the Myth of Anti-Semitism

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Iran, even in the most fanciful flights of rhetoric of some of its leaders, is not threatening to kill Jews, as Goldberg intimates. It is threatening to dismantle a system (the Zionist regime) that it regards as brutal and illegitimate.

Jeffery Goldberg of The Atlantic is a respected and well-connected American commentator on U.S.-Israel affairs and regional issues such as the nuclear deal with Iran. His access to top Administration officials like President Obama and Secretary of State Kerry is among the best in the business.

When he wrote a few months ago that a senior Administration official had described Benjamin Netanyahu as “chickenshit,” it caused gigantic waves in both Washington and Jerusalem. People in the know take Goldberg seriously.

So what is one to make of his latest effort, which propels the Iranian regime’s attitudes to Jews and Israel into the forefront of the ongoing debate (or virtual war) over getting the nuclear deal through Congress?

Goldberg’s confusion is evident from the start. The article is headlined “Why Iran’s Anti-Semitism Matters,” while the sub-headline is “A close read of Obama and Kerry’s comments on whether Iranian leaders seek Israel’s destruction.”

In other words, seeking Israel’s destruction—if that indeed is what the Iranian regime is after—is synonymous with anti-Semitism. But is it? And is there a consequential difference between anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism (or anti-Israelism,) or is it OK to conflate the two, as Goldberg does?

(Being a journalist I know that writers are very often not responsible for the headlines attached to their article and are at the mercy of less-stringent copy editors. But that’s not the case here. Anti-Semitism and anti-Israel are used interchangeable by Goldberg throughout the piece, as in “Does the Iranian leadership seek the elimination of Israel? I had already discussed the nature of Iranian-regime anti-Semitism with Obama in a May interview.”)

Merriam-Webster defines anti-Semitism as “hostility toward or discrimination against Jews as a religious, ethnic or racial group.” Oxford defines it as “hostility to or prejudice against Jews.”

The Anti-Defamation League defines it as: “The belief or behavior hostile toward Jews just because they are Jewish. It may take the form of religious teachings that proclaim the inferiority of Jews, for instance, or political efforts to isolate, oppress, or otherwise injure them. It may also include prejudiced or stereotyped views about Jews.”

The only reasonable conclusion is that, to be defined as anti-Semitism, a statement would, at the very least, need to refer to Jews. Is that the case with the Iranian leadership as quoted by Goldberg in his article?

The answer is no. The only statement quoted by Goldberg—Iran’s Supreme Leader saying “This barbaric, wolflike, and infanticidal regime of Israel which spares no crime has no cure but to be annihilated,”—does not mention Jews. But he is thoughtful enough to link to another piece from March this year which is full of quotes.

I counted 17 quotes in the second article, only one of which makes any mention of Jews—and that was from Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah in Lebanon and not an Iranian at all. Hezbollah may be an ally and client of Iran, but I doubt whether the proud Persians would have him speak for them.

The other quotes—from Iran’s Supreme Leader, previous presidents, military leaders and so on—make abundant mention of Israel and the “Zionist regime” and are replete with words such as “destroy” and “eliminate,” but they include not a single mention of Jews. Nothing.

Goldberg, it turns out, is deploying a new, extra-dictionary definition of anti-Semitism which goes something like this: In addition to hostility and prejudice against Jews, anti-Semitism also covers any statement or action against Israel that could be regarded as anti-Semitism if it were targeted at Jews. He anchors that by regularly referring to Israel as “the sovereign Jewish state in the Middle East,” thus creating the Israel-Jew symbiosis.

It’s a sub-set of Netanyahu’s definition of anti-Semitism, which covers any and all criticism of his government. In 2014, Netanyahu denounced all supporters of boycotts against Israel as “classical anti-Semites in modern garb”—a definition that includes many Jews and Israelis, myself included, who believe that only concerted pressure on Israel from outside will compel Israel to end the occupation.

Goldberg doesn’t go quite as far as Netanyahu, but his definition is still highly problematic.

The accepted view of classical anti-Semitism is that it cannot be attributed to any Jewish action or mechanism. In other words, whatever Jews may have said or done over the years—killing Jesus, usury and so on—they are not a valid basis or justification for anti-Semitism. Anti-Jewish prejudice is a pathology, abstracted from the actions of individual Jews or any groups they may comprise.

Using the term anti-Semitism with regard to Israel means, therefore, that Israel is above criticism. It means that, whatever its policies or its actions, Israel cannot be held accountable—and that all those who try to hold it to account are beyond the pale. Sick, perverted human beings.

But history says otherwise. In the two or three decades following its foundation, Israel was the darling of the world (with the exclusion of the Arab and Muslim states,) including of many Western progressives. That slowly changed as Israel cemented it grip on the occupied territories, undertook wide-scale settlement, employed brutal and often-fatal measures against Palestinian civilians and made it quite clear to anyone who was prepared to listen that it had no intention of ever relinquishing the land it conquered.

Israeli action alone turned the world-wide admiration of the Fifties and Sixties into the antipathy and even hatred that we saw on the streets of Europe during last year’s Gaza war and the burgeoning activism of the boycott movement. The same goes for the increasing calls for recognition of Palestine in European parliaments and the evident exasperation of most European governments after almost 50 years of occupation.

It is disingenuous and deeply mistaken to equate anti-Israel sentiment with anti-Semitism. The latter is a pathology, a deformity, while the former is a legitimate political position stemming from the repeated actions of successive Israeli governments over the past half-century.

It suits Netanyahu’s purposes to reduce all criticism to pogroms and the Holocaust, but what’s Goldberg’s excuse?

I imagine he would say that there’s a difference between garden-variety anti-Zionism and the exterminatory rhetoric of members of the Iranian regime. Or, as he put it in his article, “If, in the post-Holocaust world, a group of people express a desire to hurt Jews, it is, for safety’s sake, best to believe them.”

It takes an extraordinary degree of geo-political obliviousness (not to mention cognitive dissonance) to distill Israel, a powerful country with a large non-Jewish minority, into Goldberg’s “Jews,” evocative as they are of the imperiled and defenseless victims of the Holocaust. His starting point is the “post-Holocaust world,” but his Jews are the same, old, pre-Holocaust Jews.

Goldberg’s Jews are a threadbare stereotype. They are not Israel and Israel is not them. Not everyone in Israel is Jewish and not all Jews are Zionist. In the early days of the state, as Uri Avnery wrote recently, Jewishness was barely mentioned. ‘Everything pertaining to the Jewish community in the Land of Israel was ‘Hebrew.’” That has changed in recent decades, as the state mutated into a Jewish alien under the influence of the settlement enterprise. But there remains a world of difference between Israel and global Jewry.

Iran, even in the most fanciful flights of rhetoric of some of its leaders, is not threatening to kill Jews, as Goldberg intimates. It is threatening to dismantle a system (the Zionist regime) that it regards as brutal and illegitimate. There are many others around the world who aspire to the same goal.

And that’s OK. The United States and the Soviet Union spent decades threatening to dismantle each other’s regime. The Republicans in Congress still threaten to dismantle the Cuban regime. In fact, the U.S. has a glorious history of regime dismantlement (think Mosaddegh in 1953.) And Israel itself has not been shy to support insurrectionists when it suited its purposes. Ask the Christians in Lebanon or the Kurds in Iraq.

Israel and Iran are ideological enemies and regional rivals. Behind the bluster from both sides is a struggle for hegemony and influence. Being the sole regional superpower is a strategic imperative for both. Neither truly believes it can eliminate the other, but the lack of nuclear balance—currently very much in Israel’s favor—is dangerously destabilizing.

The purpose of the nuclear agreement is to reduce tensions in the regime by averting a nuclear arms race (or preventing it from reaching a tipping-point.) That’s a good start, but for it to have true long-term benefit, it needs to be accompanied by regional nuclear disarmament.

Instead of peddling the worn anti-Semitism shibboleth, Goldberg should look beyond Netanyahu’s fear-mongering and Holocaust obsession. He could start by calling out Obama and Kerry whenever they talk of Iranian anti-Semitism, as they are wont to do. The water is heavy enough without being muddied by disinformation.

Jews probably hate Iran much more than Persians hate Jews. Heck, the Israelis would probably join with 20 other Arab dictatorships if it meant destroying the Iranians completely. Wouldn't they?

Posted by Hanja Kim on 2016-05-29 09:27:00

You term "anti-Jewarchism" is anti-Jewish in itself. It is a hateful and stupid generalization about a whole group. By the way, why do you think Jewish bankers are different from non-Jewish ones. It is the non-Jewish bankers that have most of the investment capital and government connections. You are a bigot!

Posted by Steve on 2015-09-02 14:43:20

First of all, any call for the violent destruction of Israel is without question anti-Semitic. The consequence would necessarily be the murder of thousands of Jews most of them without culpability of any crimes against anyone (Yes, Israelis are women, children the aged and infirm as well). Could anyone imagine someone saying in all seriousness, "My call for the total destruction of Africa isn't racist. After all I never mentioned Black folks, just Africa as a political entity with sovereign countries." What utter nonsense!!

Let me make two key points. First, I fully support the US treaty with Iran, currently being debated in the US Senate, and would like to see the racist Likud disappear. Secondly, I would like to see the post-Zionist movement, of which Avnery is a proponent (his book Israel Without Zionism is an excellent read), succeed in creating a post-Zionist binational state of all the diverse people of Israel/Palestine. But all calls for violence of any kind are hateful. How you express your ideas are as important as the ideas themselves!!

Posted by Steve on 2015-09-02 14:40:22

you sound like the Old white men of the Republican Party

Posted by Smiley69ya on 2015-09-01 10:31:08

that number you posted is an exaggeration because Iran does allow anyone be they Jewish, Christian, Shia or Sunni Musilm to come or go as they please.

why is it that the "experts" are always people who have never been to the nation in question or even live in that part of the world? my family is from the area and I visit friends and relatives in Kuwait, Iran and Yemen frequently. My cousin is in Iraq at the moment.

Posted by Josie Gimhaegim on 2015-08-27 00:05:37

If Iran is so wonderful to Jews, why has 90% of it's Jewish citizens fled?

Posted by sharonsj on 2015-08-21 15:55:05

Jews are allowed only one seat in the Iranian parliament. Five seconds of googling would have gotten you that fact.

From the Trans Arab Research Institute: "But in order to maintain their hold over a rather restive Palestinian population, the Arab [League] states resolved to launch a Palestinian movement officially sanctioned by the Arab leadership. Therefore, in 1964 the Palestine National Council convened in Jerusalem mainly at the behest of Arab leaders and moved to establish the Palestine Liberation Organization."

You may be confusing the PLO with Hamas. Israel for years tolerated and, in some cases, encouraged Hamas as a counterweight to the secular nationalists of the PLO.

There is more, but it is obvious you are not so much ignorant but prone to believe all sorts of propagandist shit about Jews and Israel.

Posted by sharonsj on 2015-08-21 15:53:01

Iran always had and still does have the largest population of Jews outside of Israel who are protected by the Iranian constitution. Many of them have visas and are free to come and go and visit their friends and relatives in Israel or anywhere else whenever they please.....the notion that Iran is anymore or less "anti-semitic" than any other nations is ridiculous.....there are anti-semites and other racists there just as in any other nation but while I was in Iran it seemed to me as though the percentage was lower than in either South Korea, Canada or the United States. I've lived and spent time in each of them and have friends and relatives in all four countries

Posted by Josie Gimhaegim on 2015-08-19 18:22:27

I'm sick of that stupid word "antisemitism," which is so grossly manipulated by Jewish interests. The correct word is ANTI-JEWISM (a word that includes the racist hatred of all Jews) or ANTI-JEWARCHISM, for people who fear or hate excessive Jewish power or corruption. I'm a proud anti-jewarchist who doesn't support Israel and think Israel and "Jewish bankers" have far too much control over the U.S. government and the U.S. in general.

As a candidate for Washington State Governor, I'm making Jewspeak a campaign issue. See http://2016.politix.us and get involved. As Carl Sagan (my favorite Jew) said, "Don't sit this one out."

The Anti-Defamation League's Global 100 looks at antisemitism around the world. It found that Iran is the LEAST anti-Semitic country in the Middle East and North Africa. Greece, Armenia, Malaysia are all more anti-Semitic. Iran compares in its level of antisemitism to Panama, Senegal and South Korea.

Posted by xpxpxp on 2015-08-16 15:51:49

Mea culpa, Mr/Ms Nondemoniational. Next time I'll try to insert the word "intersectionality."

Posted by Louis Nayman on 2015-08-16 13:35:47

Don't you neoconservatives ever use a vocabulary that someone else hasn't given you? You've been reading David Horowitz and Pamela Geller too much. Get a life. And a vocabulary of your own.

Posted by Nondenominational on 2015-08-16 12:43:41

"I don't think the destruction of Israel could ever be accomplished without some Jews being killed and in this sense at least extreme anti-Zionism has anti-Semitic consequences..." Hm. By this logic, defending oneself against a Jewish murderer or rapist could ALSO be considered anti-Semitic. But I seriously doubt that anyone (especially the Iranians with their puny defense budget) fighting an enemy expects to totally annihilate every last person in the enemy state; it would be enough to put the regime or its most awful feature (Zionism) out of business (you know, the time-honored American practice of regime change). That in itself is not genocidal -- unless of course you buy into the view that ending repressive Jewish Apartheid sovereignty is anti-semitic, which I do not.

Posted by Nondenominational on 2015-08-16 12:42:23

I agree that there is an important difference, but I don't think the destruction of Israel could ever be accomplished without some Jews being killed and in this sense at least extreme anti-Zionism has anti-Semitic consequences. The doctrine of double effect doesn't fly in politics; you cannot know a consequence of an action or cause without intending it along with the desired consequences. That being said, I do think that what many in Iran at least profess to want, namely an end to Israel's imperialism, is just and reasonable, and the rest can be compromised on.

Posted by Dante on 2015-08-16 09:54:37

Congratulations on a tightly argued logical case for less brainless sloganeering, and the rule of international law.

I'll be waiting for some US presidential candidate to mention Israel's nuclear arsenal. I won't be holding my breath, though.

Posted by Ormond Otvos on 2015-08-15 17:00:39

Good post, let us not forget that a jewish group helped to setup the PLO. There are jewish lawmakers in the government of Iran. In fact by law there has to be at least one jewish lawmaker. Some reports state there are 3 jewish lawmakers in the government of iran. Even in the begining the clerical leadership stated hands off the jewish people. There is a jewish sect that states death to Israel, this is not a joke and they are real. Now for some more fun, a jewish blog stated that that strange Mr "A" from Iran had a jewish father and mother. This guy is fluent in the jewish writings and Hebrew. It is a fact that there are jews in his family.